(Fixes link to photo essay)
By Krisztina Than and Marton Monus
BUDAPEST (Reuters) – Lau and Vivi, a young lesbian couple in Hungary, often hold hands walking through Budapest’s streets. However, Lau has started to have troubling second thoughts about this show of affection since the government ramped up its anti-LGBTQ+ campaign.
Right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who casts himself as a defender of what he calls Christian values from Western liberalism and whose supporters are mostly rural conservatives, has passed several laws affecting the lives of Hungary’s LGBTQ+ community over the past decade.
These include banning a change of gender in personal documents, legislation that effectively halts adoption by same-sex couples, and a law banning the use of materials in schools seen as promoting homosexuality and gender transition.
In March, parliament passed a law that created a legal basis for police to ban Pride marches, key events for the LGBTQ+ community worldwide in campaigning for rights, celebrating diversity and highlighting discrimination. Orban’s Fidesz party said Pride could be harmful to children and so protecting them should supersede the right to assemble.
“Somehow unconsciously, I started to think whether I should dare to hold Vivi’s hand in front of a child now,” said Lau (Laura Toth), 37, a DJ and sound technician working in Budapest’s vibrant club scene. “This does not mean I will not hold her hand now, but something started to work inside me.”
Her partner, 27-year-old Vivien Winkler, says it is surreal that they should feel they are doing something wrong if they hug or kiss each other in the street, as they are in love and could even marry down the line – though in another country. Hungary has never allowed gay marriage, only civil unions.
The couple fell in love two years ago. With their dog, they have moved into a cosy flat full of books and photos, and have set up a small studio in one room, where Lau makes her own music. She is set to release a track which she calls “a queer love song”.
Along with love, they also found true inspiration in each other.
“This LP is about my personal coming out story,” she said with a knowing smile, as this was not easy for her growing up in a town in eastern Hungary. With the help of therapy, she finally came out 2-3 years ago, first to her grandma, who was more accepting than her parents. Vivien had a similar experience with her grandparents in Budapest who were very quick to embrace Lau as a member of the family.
They are happy together and both regularly DJ in clubs. But they feel the air is thinning for LGBTQ+ people. “We are continuously discussing that we may need to move abroad next year,” Vivien said.
DEFYING THE BAN
Orban told his supporters in February that Pride organisers “should not even bother” planning the event this year. Some saw this as a tactic to hold on to conservative votes – in 2026 he faces elections and a new opposition party poses a serious challenge to his rule.
“We’ve defended the right of parents to decide how their children are brought up, and we’ve curbed views and fashions that are against nature,” the veteran leader said in May.
Passage of the new law allowed police last week to ban the 30th Pride march due on June 28. However, Budapest’s liberal mayor said the march will be held on that date nonetheless, as a municipal event celebrating freedom, allowing it to circumvent the ban.
Thirty-three foreign embassies including those of France, Germany and Britain, although not the United States, have backed the event.
“Pride will not ask for permission: this is a protest,” the Budapest Pride organisers have said.
Lau and Vivi have attended Pride marches before but said this year’s will be especially important.
Laszlo Laner, 69, was an organiser of Budapest’s first Pride in 1997 and played an active role in Hungary’s gay movement after the collapse of the communist regime in 1989.
“I think we will have the largest crowd so far, not only of LGBTQ+ people and sympathizers but also… those who march for democracy, freedom of speech and the right to assemble,” he said.
Hungarians were mostly accepting of the LGBTQ+ community, he added. This has been underpinned by polls. A survey by pollster Median in November 2024 made for HATTER society, a Hungarian LGBTQI group, showed 53% of Hungarians said it was acceptable for two men to fall in love, and 57% said the same about two women. About 49% would support same-sex marriage.
People in Hungary are a lot less negative towards LGBTQ+ people than the government is trying to suggest, said Zsolt Hegyi, 57, who is gay and has never attended Pride but will join the march now.
Events like Pride can help people who struggle to come to terms with their feelings to open up.
“They can get some encouragement that the world will not collapse after their coming out,” he said.
LIVING AUTHENTICALLY
Ballroom culture, which originated as a safe and inclusive space for Black and Latino LGBTQ+ individuals in New York, also offers a safe space in Budapest with its regular balls, where participants compete with dances in various categories.
In Turbina, an arts and inclusive community space in the heart of Budapest, over a hundred people gathered on March 15 for a ballroom event where participants donned costumes inspired by iconic queer personalities. Iulian Paragina from Romania, a dental technician who has lived in Budapest for four years, acted as Master of Ceremony and also danced.
“As a queer person, one of the biggest challenges is simply having the courage to live authentically,” Iulian said.
“Personally, I used to feel relatively safe in Budapest, up to a point… Today, our voices are being silenced, whether it’s through banning Pride, limiting freedom of expression, or pushing harmful narratives.”
The gradual erosion of LGBTQ+ rights has had a chilling effect on the community, said Armin Egres Konig, 25, who is trans and non-binary, and works as a social worker for the rights group HATTER society.
Konig was personally affected by the 2020 law which made it impossible for transgender people to legally change their gender, as it was enacted before their coming out.
While Konig found an inclusive and accepting community at university, they find being trans can be difficult in everyday life.
“In the world out there it is very hard to be a trans person and I faced harassment in the street.”
(Writing and reporting by Krisztina Than, additional reporting by Marton Monus and Krisztina Fenyo, Editing by Alexandra Hudson)
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